Tracks

What is open source’s role in our culture and in our politics today? Demonstrate how you’re making a change in the world.

We don’t build open technology or open cultures in a vacuum. Given the political, cultural, and economic crossroads we find ourselves at right now, we’re adding a new track to explore how activists are using technology, how open source communities are supporting activists, and how other open source and activist communities intersect. While we don’t have past examples of activist talks, here are three topics we’d excited to see: ‘What technology security risks should activists pay attention to?’, ‘How can activist communities use open source technology to share information more effectively?’, and ‘What usability improvements will make open source tools more useful to activists?’

We want to know what special sauce you use for interpersonal insights!
What makes open technology and culture communities effective? Demonstrate how you motivate people to work together well. Example topics from the past include “’Why did you do that?’ You’re more automated than you think.” and “Seven Habits Of Highly Obnoxious Trolls.”

What substitutions did you make to spice things up? Show us your most ingenious hacks, kludges, work-arounds, and duct-tape jobs. It doesn’t have to be elegant, it just has to work!
Hacks are clever, sometimes not. They break the rules. They force the available material into doing what you need or want. Some hacks are illegal, and some just make you proud and/or embarrassed that it worked. Sometimes a hack is the only way. Show the world how you make your hardware and software obey your every whim. Example topics from the past include “Control Emacs with Your Beard: the All-Singing All-Dancing Intro to Hacking the Kinect” and “Location-Based Hacks – How to Automate Your Life with SMS and GPS.”

How do you get a project to work? Show us how to write the script, run the business, debug the code, and raise the funding. Share your most effective projects.
From the beginner to the advanced level, we’re looking for tips, tutorials, best practices, and collaborative development sessions. Share what you know about your favorite tools, programming languages, development techniques, and business practices. Example topics from the past include Learn Tech Management in 45 Minutes and Hands-on Virtualization with Ganeti.

We know that a combination of ingredients works, but why? Show us the science behind the recipe. Explain the components of a project and how they interact.
Explore how our technology works on the lowest levels, and what that can teach us about optimal use. Tell us your analysis and profiling techniques, how implementation affects function, and what a kernel is made of. Example topics from the past include “OSWALD: Lessons from and for the Open Hardware Movement” and “Doing NoSQL with SQL.”